Mushrooms customers demand dark fruit from Ripley farm

Fruits, Nuts and Vegetables LLC of Fort Ripley started out trying to become the Willy Wonka of vegetables. But their business has blossomed thanks to the harvesting of mushrooms.

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Christy Paulson and Matt Ratliff pose for a picture in the middle of tree trunks that cultivate mushrooms for the couple to sell at local farmer's market and grocery stores around the area.
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William Camargo, wcamargo@stcloudtimes.com
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FORT RIPLEY – While watching "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" with his wife, Matt Ratliff came to a revelation.

"We should be the Willy Wonka with veggies," Ratliff said.

After a decade in sales, the Sauk Rapids-Rice High School graduate quit his job and moved north to a secluded family property four years ago. He built a house and started Fruits Nuts and Vegetables LLC — a farm in the process of being certified organic.

While recovering from knee surgery, Ratliff became perplexed at an unused counter in his new kitchen.

"I was trying to figure out what we could grow on this shelf that gets no sunlight at all," Ratliff said.

So his Wonka dream took a page out of "Alice in Wonderland." Internet searches brought Ratliff to mushrooms.

And producing the fungus that thrives in darkness has become the farm's first golden ticket.

They harvest 40-50 pounds of mushrooms each week from 22 varieties.

They have vendor spots at various farmers markets and Summertime by George! They've had lines before events open, and they've sold out in as little as 20 minutes. They sell to grocery stores, restaurants and co-ops. And they sell mushrooms online to customers all over the country.

"Right now, the demand is much higher than the supply," said Ratliff, who also teaches mushroom-growing classes.

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(Photo: William Camargo, wcamargo@stcloudtimes.com)

The farm even sells mushroom kits. They pre-inoculate logs with the fungus, and customers can harvest within six to 12 months with little maintenance.

"The most common questions we get: 'Are they edible?' and 'Are they legal?' " said Christy Paulson, Ratliff's wife who usually runs the vendor spots.

The answer to both questions is yes.

But the process of harvesting mushrooms isn't easy. Getting fungi to fruit is an exact science.

They keep detailed spreadsheets on each growing fungi, monitoring each step of the way.

After trees are cut down, they must be inoculated within 24 hours.

"It's pretty labor intensive, and it makes for a long day," Ratliff said.

Ratliff drills holes in the logs and fills them with mycelium plugs — the vegetative part of a fungus. The mycelium absorbs nutrients from the log to form the mushroom.

While the mushroom is forming, the logs are stood up.

"That way you are forcing the mushroom to pull more nutrients and energy out of that log — producing larger caps," Ratliff said.

(Photo: <243>William Camargo, wcamargo@stcloudtimes.com)

Ratliff also makes mushrooms in large sanitized buckets using straw and agricultural waste from grain mills. It's inoculated with grain spawn. And holes are drilled into the side of the bucket where the mushrooms form.

Once they are ready for harvest, the mushrooms pop off easily. And Ratliff and Paulson make sure to save a few for their own consumption.